Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Louis VI]

[omgitsmax]

I have been meaning to post this for a while but i've been busy (lazy tbh) but here it is. These are some tips based on a lot of research I have done. I have been following some of these principles and have lost a constant 1-2 kg a week for the past month and a half. While that isn't all that impressive the more important thing (and the reason why you might want to read this post) is that all of that weight loss has been fat. I have been using the body scanner at my gym every other week and my body fat % has been tumbling down (and i give myself 2 cheat meals a week!). that my friends, is the only thing that matters. Don't be focused on how much "weight" you are losing. The scale is very deceptive. First, when you have a major diet change, a lot of the weight you are gonna "lose" at first, is coming from water. You are changing how much water you intake and also changing how much salt and other things that affect your cells ability to retain water. Secondly, by crash dieting or effectively starving yourself (look at me mom! I'm only eating 700 calories a day!), you are causing your body to starve and it will not just eat up fat for energy but also your muscles (which is very bad and i'll explain why).Thirdly, Focus on how you look and feel and not by the numbers on the scale. If you don't lose any weight one week but feel skinnier and your clothes fit better, then obviously something is happening!

Your body is going to burn calories in 3 ways.
First, is the thermic effect from eating. Rather, about 10-30% of the calories you burn everyday are from your body naturally breaking down and digesting the food you eat. This is the reason why you don't eat sugar or fats or simple carbohydrates (white bread, rice, etc.) because they expend very little energy to break down and they are converted easily to sugar (causing insulin spikes) and are converted to fat storage easily. By eating protein, fiber, and complex carbohydrates you are going to increase the amount of calories your body expends to break these foods down. Your body uses about 25 calories to break down every 100 calories of protein consumed. Fats are about 10 to 15 calories burned for every 100 calories.
Second, about 10-15% percent of your daily calorie burn comes from moving your muscles. Standing, walking, jogging, scratching your back, helping your kids with their book work, whatevs.
Third, the largest percent of your daily calorie burn comes from your basal metabolism. This is about 60-80%. Your basal metabolism refers to the calories your body burns when u sleep, watch tv, teach englishee. This is from your heart beating and lungs breathing, etc. Strictly as a numbers game, this form of burning calories is the most important.

So both the diet nutrition side of diet and the exercise side of diet should be optimized to burn the most amount of calories and fat.

Nutrition:
Out of all the diet eating rules, the only things you need to remember is avoid sugar, avoid refined carbohydrates, and avoid bad fats. Increase protein and vegetables and fruit. Try to eat many small meals throughout the day (i usually eat 7) to keep your metabolism revved up.
Yes the majority of weight loss is going to be dependent on what you eat.
For example, I might burn off 300 calories running on the treadmill for half an hour. 1 trip to paris baguette and 30 seconds later, i just nulled my half hour of hard work in the gym with 1 or 2 snacks. That's why weight loss occurs though your nutrition. It's all about what you are putting into your body that determines if you lose or gain weight. So what should we eat? Proteins expend more energy for your body to naturally digest and break down so try to increase the amount of your daily caloric intake from lean proteins. Also plenty of fruits and vegetables and beans/nuts (beware of salty nuts though). This also helps you stave of binge eating from being too hungry/feeling trapped by your diet. The main key is focusing on lean proteins. I usually have 3 or 4 meals a day that involve lean proteins. Why are they the most important? 1)Your body expends more energy to break them down compared to other foods. 2)It keeps you feeling full longer. 3)Lean proteins are not as high in calories as other foods like fats or dairy or carbohydrates. 4)It helps you build muscle and keeps your body burning fat all day. Proteins are necessary for repairing muscles and other tissues from exercising. This is super important because of....well the exercise part of the diet

Exercise:
For those people trying to lose fat my main suggestion is to lift weights. For every pound of muscle you put on, your body's basal metabolism increases by about 50 calories. Simply put, your body now requires 50 more calories a day to live. If you put on 6 pounds of muscle, your body is going to be burning 300 more calories a day just by being alive. That could be an extra BR pistachio almond ice cream cone every day for dessert with all the extra calories your body is burning everyday. haha. Seriously though, think about if your body was burning an extra 300 calories a day. You would effectively lose about 1 pound every 10 or 11 days just from being alive. (how many pounds would that be in 1 year?). This is why eating lean proteins is important, because they are essential to helping your body repair and build muscle after lifting. Not only is weight training better for long term weight management by helping you build muscle and increasing your basal metabolism. Weight Training is better because of the afterburn effect. What is that? Well...after you are finished doing cardio, your metabolism is going to be elevated for 30-60 mins after you finish (your body is cooling itself down, you are breathing harder, your heat is beating faster). So even if you burn 300 cals on the treadmill, you are going to keep burning for an hour after you get off, Ass-ah! The reason lifting is important is because even though you don't burn as many calories from the actual lifting process, the after burn effect from your body repairing and rebuilding muscles last longer, much longer, like up to 48 hours longer. I read somewhere (men's health report I think) that protein synthesis (the process that builds bigger muscles from working out) actually increased 20% about 3 hours AFTER the workout. If you lift 3 times a week you are essentially keeping your body in constant muscle repair mode meaning that you are keeping your metabolism in overdrive all week long. And for those people that say "Well I don't want to look like hulk or be huge, I want to slim down" Trust me, you won't. you aren't lifting hard enough or long enough to be putting on that kind of muscle. You think Arnold became the governator by lifting weights for 1 hour a day 3 times a week. Me neither.
If you want to continue to do cardio though, i would suggest looking into HIT cardio (alternating high and low intensity). Finally. If your choice is between running or not exercising, choose running.

Here is an article comparing the two from livestrong
http://www.livestrong.com/article/295718-does-lifting-weights-burn-more-calories-than-cardio/

and an article from men's health about simple ways to increase your metabolism
http://www.menshealth.com/mhlists/rev-your-metabolism/stay-hydrated.php#

Good look everyone, and make sure to remember: Take it 1 day at a time. Set small goals for yourself. If you fail today, just get back on the horse tomorrow. It's a lifestyle change so don't beat yourself up.

To OP: Congratulations on all your success so far. I know you are inspiring a lot of people. I would however caution you to take a closer look at your diet and think about its long term potential. I have read that you plan to reintroduce some things later on after a year is over. If they are healthy foods i think it wouldn't hurt to introduce them slowly now anyways because even if you lose the 100 pounds, that is only half the battle. It is keeping the weight off that is often times more difficult. I would encourage you to start doing some weight training, even if it is just a little, I think it would help your out since your goal is for this to be a long term goal and not a crash diet. The first 40 might have been easy (water/muscle/fat combined) but i can assure you that the last 40 will not. Good luck!

[highstreet]

Yea I wouldn't listen to the above poster.

He's dieting and lifting and all the weight he's lost is fat? Impossible.

And those body fat scanners at your gym are crap, don't trust it.

[omgitsmax]

LOL. my assumption is by dieting I am probably losing muscle as well. But I'm in the gym lifting every week to continually rebuild muscle...hence replacing the lost muscle from dieting? Whether you believe the body scanners or not i guess to each their own, I'm just using the resources i got and going by the numbers I have seen

[Louis VI]

END OF WEEK 10 UPDATE: 125.2 kg weight and 118 cm waist

I lost 1.9 kg (over 4 pounds) this week. And that was with doing less exercise and eating more food! I have added salmon to my menu, the first time I've cooked it since the ol' stream fishin' back home in the nineties. I'll cook it once a week and man, does it taste good! I have also added - at least temporarily, for the summer - beef jerky (the freshly made at E-Mart variety), mainly for the easy quick protein it provides, especially with camping season about to hit (I will be pitching a tent for about 10-14 nights over the next three months, with my long weekends and two one-week vacations coming up). It's not ideal to have jerky, but it and nuts will be protein staples on my summer travels, plus a few seafood restaurant stops along the way.

The waist size is unchanged but that's not surprising given the lack of vigorous exercise. I walk but I haven't hiked, swam or played basketball or tennis since the rains began in June (boy has it been rainy and foggy here on Jeju, more so than ever I experienced in eight summers on the mainland). I am concerned about waist size but haven't made it a priority - yet. The first half of my yearlong project is focussed primarily on what I eat and how much I weigh. The second half I'll be kicking up the exercise intensity and expecting improvement abdominally, though, my stomach IS noticably smaller, the widest part is still wide.

I started this project on my birthday in May and I'm on pace to pass the 50-pounds-lost midway point by the end of this month, two months ahead of schedule, three months ahead of the minimum pace required to lose 100 pounds before my next birthday.

[Louis VI]

I make it a point to eat protein and veggies with each of my six minimeals a day. Protein is slow digesting and veggies provide the lion's share of needed nutrients. No pill popping here!

My six minimeal schedule:

1. A mini cup of plain yoghurt with I sprinkle with cinnamon and accompanied by celery sticks.
2. One egg and two yolks (or two eggs no extra yolks) is added to a huge frying pan (full plate worth) breakfast of onions, half a dozen garlic cloves, lots of hot peppers and at least two colors of sweet peppers, a couple of sliced mushrooms, sprinkles of szechuan pepper and black pepper and consumed with two glasses of lemon squeezed water.
2b. A full glass of whole milk mid morning sometimes with munchie snack veggies (broccoli, green onion, cauliflower, celery, bell pepper).
3. A handful of meat (chicken drumsticks twice a week, beef twice or thrice, pork at most once, now adding salmon into the weekly rotation). Always the meat is eaten with twice the amount of veggies at least (this is when I eat kale and swiss chard, as wraps for the meat half the time - other times the meat is in stews).
4. Spinach salad with sprinkles of parmasan cheese, squeezed lemons and squirted cider vinegar.
5. A handful of almonds with some veggies, usually green onions or bell peppers.
6. A small portion of block cheese, different kind depending on the day, consumed with veggies, often popping broccoli or cauliflower alongside.

Twice a week I substitute soup in place of the spinach salad or meat minimeal. It's a soup of asparagus and red cabbage, with lots of my staple veggies: hot peppers, onions, garlic, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, shaked spices, fresh parsley, a little cider vinegar. It's spicy purple broth is awesome!

I go through at least two litres of bottled samdasoo water every day (and about 3-5 fresh lemons, cut in half and squeezed into the water). I have a cup of tea some days, chamomile or green tea, sometimes rooibos, nothing added, just hot, or cold.

I believe my regular menu is quite nutritious. I eat a dozen kinds of fresh vegetables, a variety of meat and dairy, nuts (almonds) every day. OMG, the amount of prep I have to do to get all that fresh food in home and ready to consume is exhausting! The essential amino acids, lipids, vitamins and minerals of my menu is considerable. What is missing? Easily processed sugar (refined, simple carbs, glucose), other than the carbs in onions, peppers and milk. I have chosen foods high in nutrition that also combat insulin resistance, since insulin is the fat-storing hormone.

[matthews_world]

Get more tofu in your diet. Steam it or crisp it up by dipping it in egg batter and frying. Great for calcium and protein.

Buy a juicer. I make a great vegetable juice - kale, spinach, celery, cucumber, carrot, and apple or Asian pear for sweetness. Your stomach will think it's full and it's already easy to digest.

[Gorf]

omgitsmax: Fats don't cause insulin spikes.

[Louis VI]

END OF WEEK 11 UPDATE: 122.1 kg weight and 119 cm waist

My waist size went up 1 cm, probably due to drinking a lot of water, but: I lost 3.1 kg (6.8 pounds) this week!! Boy was I sweating. The weather went from Seattle to Southern Cal in just a few days: the foggy, wet Monsoons from the SW ended early in the week and sunny Jeju 30 C days with low humidity (65%ish) the last few days meant I have been out and about a lot, sweating from hiking the Olle trails, getting a decent tan, ex-er-ci-sing outside for the first time in over a month.

It's official: I have lost over 50 pounds (22.9 kg to be exact) since the beginning of May, in under 3 months. Allllll-riiiighhhht!!

I have gone through two belts, people say the loss is most noticeable on my face and back, though even my watch has to be tightened a notch or two as I seem to be losing weight everywhere. The spare tire has surprisingly gone down the least, or not so suprising given the relative lack of vigorous exercise, but even the tire is much less thick, and certainly the hips and pants-wearing-place below the bulge has shrunk considerably. I feel like I'm swimming in my tailored suits!

And I did it by eating a lot and often, six minimeals a day. I ate every single day lots of vegetables, specifically onions, garlic, sweet peppers, hot peppers, mushrooms, celery, green onion, broccoli, cauliflower and at least one kind of leafy green (spinach and swiss chard, with some kale). Two days a week a soup with asparagus and red cabbage as center pieces.

I consumed protein everyday with a 2:1 veggie-to-protein ratio. I ate meat, cheese, yogurt, eggs, nuts EVERYDAY and whole milk many days. The meat was either boiled chicken drumsticks (my fav part) or beef (ground or steak, fried or stewed), with occasional pork, pepperoni, beef jerky or fish.

I ate absolutely no sugar (except for lactose in whole milk, one glass every other day on average), nor consumed any carbs (no grains) except those from veggies (ate no potatoes or carrots though), dairy and nuts.

I drank over 2 L of water everyday with freshly squeezed lemons (went through 3-4 lemons a day, cheap) and ice cubes.

I was never hungry and I ate at least six minieals a day. In fact, eating was a chore I made myself do often so my body wouldn't lower its metabolism in an attempt to save for a rainy day, so to speak. And because I had protein with whatever carbs are in veggies (onions and peppers have some carbs) - in conjunction with the fibre of those foods - meant that there was no insulin spike and thus no hormonal driven response to store blood sugar in fat cells.

Eating fat doesn't make you fat, it can help make you thin! Just make sure you have lots of nutrition, nutrients and vitamins provided naturally in a variety of vegetables. And avoid what does make one fat: sugar makes one fat, sugar in the blood, which means all kinds of sugar including refined carbohydrates like rice, bread and noodles. And it's true what is said: carb cravings go away when one stops cold turkey. Yes, there are withdrawl symptoms the first three or four days, as your body has relied on the quick glucose (gawd was I dead tired those first 3-4 days), but the body adapts and one quickly (by day 5 I was feeling normal) can kick the habit and eat foods that provide more nutrition, more protein (essential amino acids) and more fats (essential lipids).

50 pounds down, 50 more to go!

[qcat79]

great job man!

ever since you started posting, i've been telling the adjummas not to give me big servings at my local student restaurant, but since the rice is so horrible in taste there, i have just started refusing it all together as of last week.

my trouble comes with naengmyeon. i love that stuff. i don't intend to stop as i only really need to lose 5 kgs and need the energy for my jogging. i do also eat apples and bananas regularly....and recently if i feel like emptying my wallet, cherries.

i guess i'd have to say, you're next big challenge is to get out exercising everyday, rain or shine. i'll jog/walk in the rain if i have to.

[Louis VI]

[qcat79]

how are you doing with the money saving so far?

[Zyzyfer]

The spare tire is the first to show and last to go.

[tukmax]

Louis, have you heard of the Paleo Diet? If not I suggest googling it. It is pretty close to what you are doing already so it won't be anything new, but interesting nonetheless.

my suggestion.

[English Matt]

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